Method and apparatus for determining the calorific value of gases



c. H. LANPHIER. METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DE-TERMINING'THE cALoRIFlc vALuE 0F GASES APPLICTIQN FILED AJUNI-I 23, 1919.

Patbnd @et 117, 1922.

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Patented @et 17, 12922;v

unir-an stares maar enterar CHARLES I-I. LANPHIER, 0F SPRINGFIELD,ILLINOIS.

METHOD, .AND .APPARATUS FOR DETERMINING THE CALORIEIC VALUE 0F GASES.

Application filed June 23,

To @ZZ wlw/mi t may concert,

Be it known that I, CHARLES H. LANPHmR, a citizen of the United States,residingat Springfield, .county of Sangamon, and State of Illinois, haveinvented .certain new and usefulImprovements in Methods and Apparatusfor Determining the Calorific Value of Gases, of which the following isa specication. j y

My invention relates to a method and apparatus for determining thecalorific value utilizes the kno-wn fact that the bright blue y flame ofilluminating gas burned in a burner of the type known as the Bunsenburner indicates practically complete combustion resulting from anadequate supply of oxygen from the air, and that when the air supply inthe mixing chamber is insufficient a yellow p vtip will appear in theinner cone of the flame and will indicate incomplete combustion. In.carrying out my invention, I introduce a gas of known calorific valueyhereinafter referred toas the laboratory gas, to a Bunsen burner, ignitethe same, and then adjust the burner so that the yellow tip in theinnercone of the flame will just disappear, the parts of the burner which arerovided with graduations indicating stan ard thermal units yhaving beenpreviously set to correspond to the laboratory gas. I then shut off thesupply oflaboratory gas and introduce tothe burner ,the gas to betested, hereinafter referred to as the commercial gas, and afterigniting the same adjust the graduated portion of the burner untiltheluminous tip disappears. The reading of the graduations on the burnerwill then indicate the caloriiic value of the gas being tested.

M yinvention will be more'readily understoodI by v'reference to theaccompanying drawings forming apart of this specification and in which,-I

, Figure 1 is a vertical sectional viewofithe preferred form ofapparatus embodying my 1919. serial No. 306,149.

Figure 3 is a similar section on the line 1 3-3 of Figurel.

Figure et is an elevation of a key used in calibrating the instrument,and

Figure 5 is a side elevation of a modied form of the device.

Referring now t0 the drawings, 1 indicates the base ofthe device whichis preferably cylindrical and supported upon suitable legs 2. In theupper part of the base 1 is an air chamber 8 which is in .communicationwith the atmosphere through a plurality of apertures 4. A closure 5 isprovided for they upper end of the chamber and vis preferably threadedinto the upper end of the base -as indicated. A burner tube 6 has itslower end threaded into the base 1, as at 7 and extends upwardly throughthe chamber 3 and closure 5. n-elongated aperture 9 is provided in thetube 6 within the chamber Bfo-r 'a purpose hereinafter described. A plug10 is threaded into the lower end of the tube 6 and the base 1. This isprovided with a bore 11 communicating with a passage 12 in thelowerfportion of the base,A said assage communicating' with a supplypipe 13 for admitting gas to the apparatus. The

upper end of the bore 11 of the plug 10 lis reduced in diameter,terminating in a minute orifice 141 for the discharge of the gas intothe mixing chamber 15, the lower portion of the bore of the ltube 6comprising such chamber. 'A needle valve 16 controls the passagewaythrough the orifice 111 and has its stem threaded through the bottom ofthe base 1, as indicated at 17. The stem of the needle valve terminatesin a knurled head 18 to facilitate adjusting said valve. The upper endof the plug 10 is provided with mortises 19 to accommodate tenons 20 onthe end of a key 21. The key 21 is of greater length than the tube 6 sothat the same may be inserted through said tube and used to adjusttheplug 10 as will be described hereinafter.

vThreaded upon the lower end of the tube 6 is a sleeve 22 which extendsthrough'the closure 5, vforming a snug joint therewith,

and is adapted to control the admission of lairthrough the aperture 9from 'the air vmitted, and as it is screwed downwardly that the supplyof air will be diminished.

The 'threads 23 between the tube 6 and sleeve 52E-are preferably fortytothe inch and the tube 6 above the upper end `of the sleeve 22 isprovided with-,graduations 9.4

, arraned fort to the inch so that one comfrom drafts and dirt.

plete revolution of the sleeve will raise or lower the same the distanceof one graduation on the scale 24.' The upper end ofthe sleeve 22 isprovided with a micrometer scale which vis divided into twentyeliveequal parts, so that when the sleeve 221s `turned the dista-nce betweentwo adjacent graduations on the micrometer scale, the sleeve will'bemoved upwardly or downwardly one one-thousandth of an inch.

Each complete revolution of the sleeve will measure twenty-live B. T.`U.,"and therotation measured by one of the graduations 25 will measureone B. T. j j By providing the chamber surrounding the lower portonofthetube and sleeve, a shield is provided toprotect the air inlet air toenter the barrel or tube 6' at a uni.- form pressure and also preventsthe-hands "of the operator from coming; incontact'with ing of theorifice and'causel a wrong reading of the device. v

ln carrying outv my .method by means of the apparatus above described,rthe said ap p'aratus is'lirst Aadjusted approximately to vcompletelyburn a gas of `known caloric value. Tomthis end, the sleeve 22 isscrewed upwardly7 until the upper end thereof registers with thegraduation indicating the calori'c value of said f laboratory gas, andthen the plug l() is screwed upwardly in the base to reduce theopening); 9 to a size which, as nearly as can beA determined'in advance,

adapted 't,o'supplythe right quantity of air for perfect combustion ofthe laboratory gras. The gas isA then introduced through the pipe l'andig'nitedat the upper end of the ytube G. lf a yellowtip appears in theinner flame cone, theneedle valve'is first vregulated to adjust lthesupply' of gas.

When this reduces the supply of gas too much before the luminous tipdisappears, the plug` ,l0 must beY screwed downwardly to admit more airthrough the aperture 9. lf, on the other hand, the yellow tip does notshow inthe inner cone flame, I first increase the gas supplybyfopeningthe needle valve until a faint yellow tip shows in the inner flame cone;if, however, that adjlust lt also 'permits they ment interferes with thefull flame body,

which should bel about fourl inches in height,

the plug l0 is screwedv upwardly until the yellow tip appears in theinner liame cone and isthen justl eliminated by the method abovedescribed. When the parts have been been just eliminatedv from the flameas described, theA instrument will be ready to test the commercial gas.To dor this thejcommercial gas is introduced through the plug` *l0 and.'ignited at the upper endfof the tube -6. IThe tube 22 is `then screwedupwardly "or downwardly as required untilthe luminousv tip in theliameis just 'eliminated and" the' reading' of the instrument aslpefere` described willgive the'value of the'commercial gasv 1n terms ofthe thermal units indicated on vthe scales, in the form illustra'ted'inIB. T. U. I "For illustration only, letJ 'itbe assumed vthat the valuelof the standard gas has been found' to be 500 B. T. U. and that theinstrument has beenadjusted and setV accordingly, and that in'testingthe commercial v'gas vvthe yellow t'1`p yis visible' in ltheinner cone'of the flame, thus indicating that the caloriiic value of thecommercial gas "is greater than the caloriiic value of thelaboratory orstandard gas; low tip vthe sleeve 22v has made two and lone.- fith(22,-) counter-clockwise rotations, kthe one-'nth rota-tionbeingiindicated by the numeralf'fof the scale 25, then the readin willbe: 500 B. T. UQ-l- 55 B. T. Ujzn" T.

U., the Ytrue value of the'gas as compared V'with the standard. In the"above example the commercial gas is 55 B. T. Ufabove the (standard.

Reversely, if upon igniting'the commercial gas the yellow tip 1s notvisible inthe `inner cone ofthe flame', the absence-of theyellow Atipwill indicate thatA thewca'loritic value of the commercial gasis nogreater 'but preferably below the caloriilicvalue of1 the laboratory orstandard gas. To undy the true value of the :commercial gas comparedwith the standard gas: Assume as in theI preceding;` example, that 500B. T. U. is thec'alorific value of the laboratory or standard gas 'andthat at the start the upper edge of thesleeve isv at the graduation 500of the scale 24. lTo test the commercial gas it will benecessaryfirst'to reduce the supply of air ysuch eX? tent that the yellow tipwill appear inthe 'inner coneof'the flame and then gradual-ly'increasefthe supply of air just enough to eliminate the yellow tip andthen note'lthe readings of the scales 2e' and 25.

Assume that the yellowtip hasbeen just summed 'and that 0n the Sea-e aitheme-adyingis units and on the scale`25 the readingv's 5 units, thenthe calore value of the tested gaswould be the Vvaluevof.thestandantigas,` v500i-2B..

and "that to just eliminate the yel-l properly adjusted and? theyellowtip-l has "fio l 44:5 B. T. U. and so on for the various tests which mayoccur in practice.

l have found by experiment that the length of Bunsen tube most suitablefor a caloroptic or' the preferred form is at least twelve times the diameter of the tube, because the gas and air traversing the unusuallength of the tube become thoroughly dil'-4 fused and miXed andconsequently producey a more even and constant flaine-body than could beproduced by a tube in which the ratio of length to diameter is less thanl2 to l. l have also found by experiment that a minute gas orilice as'compared with the area of the bore of the Bunsen tube,-in practiceabout 1 to 6 is best adapted to check the velocity of the air and gasmixture beyond the point of air admission and is- .also best adapted foruse with a Bunsen tube of a length not less than twelve times thediameter of its bore. Y

In Figure 5, l have illustrated a slightly modified form of device inwhich 26 indi cates the base, `flared at the bottom, as at 27, Jformingan extended looting and a recess 2S into which extends the lower end oi2the adjusting screw 29 for the needle valve 16. A plug 10 is threadedinto the upper end of the base 26 and a gas inlet port 12 communicateswith the device between the plug 10 and adjusting screw 29. rllhe upperend of the base 26 is shouldered, as at 30, to receive the shell 31forming a main admission chamber 32, said shell beingl provided with airadmission ports 4l. The burner tube 6 is threaded into the base andthreaded upon the same is the sleeve 22. The lower end ol" the tube 6 isprovidedk With the ail admission port 9 which is controlled by sleeve 22as in the foregoing modification. The operation of the device isidentical with that of the alors-described form.

I claim i 1. rl`he method of measuring the caloric value of gas whichconsists in supplying a gas of known caloriic value to a Bunsen burner,adjusting said burner until the flame becomes non-luminous, shuttingoil' the supply of gas of known value, and introducing Jche gas to betested, adjusting the burner to eliminate the luminous flame and notingthe difference between the former and latter adjustments of the burner,substantially as described.

2. The method of measuring the calorilic value of gas consisting ofintroducing the gas in a Bunsen burner previously adjusted to completelyburn the gas of a known caloric value, adjusting the burner to eliminatethe luminous flame and noting the reading on the graduated scale,'substantially as described. l

3. A device for measuring the caloric value of gases comprising a Bunsenburner, a sleeve threaded thereon and controlling the air admission portto said burner, there being co-operating graduations on said burner andsaid sleeve, substantially as described.

d. A device for measuring the caloriic value of gases, comprising lunsenburner, including a burner tube having a graduated scale extendinglongitudinally thereof, a sleeve threaded on-said tube and controllingthe air admission rport to said burner, and the upper edge or sleevecc-operating with said scale, substantially as described.

5. A device asset :forth in claim l furtherv characterized by havinggraduations on the upper `edge oi said tube, as and for the purposespecified.

6. A device as set forth in claim 3, in combination with means forinitially Calibrating the instrumentv to a gas of known caloric value.substantially as described.

7 A device of the class described comprising a base provided with a gasadmission passageway, a burner tube entending up-` wardly from said baseand provided with an air admission port. an air chamber on said basesurrounding the lower end of said tube., a sleeve threaded on saidburner tube and controlling the air port therein, there beingcci-operating graduations on said sleeve and said tube, substantially asdescribed.

8. .d device as set forth in claim 7. in combination with a gas jet plugthreaded in said base and extending into the lower end of said burnertube and adapted to vary the size of the air admission port in saidtube, and a needle valve .controlling the orifice in said plug,substantially as described.

9. A device as set forth in claim 8 in which the cross sectional area ofthe orifice in said plug andthe cross sectional area ot the burner tubepassageway are approximately proportionately in a ratio. ot 1 to 60.

10. A. device as set forth in claim 7, in which the length of the tubeis to its diameter in the ratio of not less than 12 to 17 substan tiallyas described.

v ln testimony whereof l have signed my name to this speeication in" thepresence of two subscribing witnesses.

CHARLES H. LANPHIER.

Witnesses l FRANK H. HAMILTON, J. S. SUTTON.

